Pearson chief sells £0.5m worth of shares

Date: Monday 12 Dec 2011

LONDON (ShareCast) - Marjorie Scardinom, chief executive of Pearson, has made multiple sales of her stake in the firm on the same day it announced plans to sell its 50% stake in FTSE International to the London Stock Exchange.

Scardinom, 64, sold 32,960 at 1,147.00p each, 12,040 at 1,140.59p, and 5,000 at 1,147.49p for a total of £572,752. She now holds 1,346,244 shares, equivalent to a 0.165% stake in the firm.

Pearson, which owns the Financial Times and Penguin books, will receive £450m for its stake in FTSE. Pearson expects that FTSE will make a total post-tax contribution to 2011 adjusted earnings of around £18m.

Pearson was at pains to point out this sale is its exit “from companies that are primarily providers of financial data”. Pearson’s aim is to make money from its FT brand through the subscription model.

Scardino said: ”Proud as we are of (our) long association, FTSE's strategy is different from our own. We wish it every success as we continue to build our digital business information services around the Financial Times.”

Pearson shares are up 13% so far this year. Over the same time the FTSE 100 index is down 4.87%.